


An Empirical Investigation Into Physical Contact

by Triss_Hawkeye



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Other, The trials of mechanical bodies, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:14:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28302162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Triss_Hawkeye/pseuds/Triss_Hawkeye
Summary: The Drumbot and the Toy Soldier have a conversation about Feeling Things.
Relationships: Drumbot Brian/The Toy Soldier (The Mechanisms)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 38
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	An Empirical Investigation Into Physical Contact

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Pensysto](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pensysto/gifts).



“Toy Soldier.”

“Yes, Brian?”

“Can you feel things?”

The Toy Soldier was having one of its occasional fits of standing to attention in the bridge of the ship—perfectly aware, as far as Brian could tell, of everything going on around it, but quite content to stand still like the wooden soldier it was, sometimes for days on end. Aurora was coasting quite happily, and Brian had come up to the bridge for the quiet more than anything else, performing only a cursory check of their current bearing and the state of the stellar winds. It was rather peaceful, although try as he might, he couldn’t quite let the uncannily still figure of the Toy Soldier fade into the background of his attention. Sometimes, in one of these moods, it wouldn’t respond to conversation at all, unless perhaps you gave it an order—in which case it would follow the order to the letter, albeit a little more woodenly than normal. But sometimes it just seemed to be waiting for a prompt.

Today seemed to be one of those times, which suited Brian just fine, as he realised that perhaps he wanted a little company more than he’d initially thought.

“You know perfectly well that I can feel things!” the Toy Soldier replied, with a sharpness to its voice that meant he had probably offended it. “Like annoyance!”

“Ah, no, that wasn’t what I meant,” Brian answered quickly. “Of course I know you can feel  _ feelings. _ I meant more… well… if you touch something, can you feel it? Physically?”

The Toy Soldier cocked its head. “I haven’t thought about that in a long time, so I’m not sure.”

Setting aside the intriguing implication that the answer to that question may not remain constant over time, Brian got up and walked over. The Toy Soldier’s face was as immobile as his own was, the set of its expressions limited to those that could fit around its eerie, placid painted smile, although the tilt of its head and wide brightness of its eyes indicated a lively curiosity. 

“Hmm. Hold out your hand,” Brian ordered, and it did, happily. Brian tapped a finger into the centre of its palm. The pressure sensors in his own body sent the usual signals that he was in contact with something, and their intensity and constancy told him that it was hard and smooth, the steady signal of polished wood. Over the centuries he could interpret those signals as easily as he could the sensations of flesh, back when he’d still had it, but that’s all they were—signals. Little pulses of electric current. And he knew that that’s what nerves are, after all, so why should it feel any different? Yet in his mortal body it had felt like  _ feeling _ something, and in this one it did not.

“Do you feel that?” he asked.

“Yes!” replied the Toy Soldier. 

Brian removed his finger from the Toy Soldier’s palm, noting the cessation of the contact signal. “Now close your eyes.”

Obediently, the Toy Soldier did so. Brian slowly and silently pressed his fingertip back into the Toy Soldier’s palm.

“Do you feel this too?” he asked. 

“Yes!”

“If you really feel it, can you tell me how many fingers I’m touching you with?” He added a second finger next to the first.

“You’re touching my hand with two fingers!” the Toy Soldier replied cheerfully.

“You can feel that?”

The Toy Soldier shrugged. “I know that’s what you’re doing.”

“Yes, but can you  _ feel _ it?” Brian knew his voice sounded increasingly desperate and frustrated, and he knew that it was unfair to take it out on the Toy Soldier, looking for an answer it was probably unable to give. And yet he couldn’t quite stop himself from pressing. “Can you actually feel it, or are you just pretending?”

The Toy Soldier snatched its hand back and stomped its foot. “What does it matter if I’m pretending to feel it or not?” it snapped. “What difference does it make to you?”

Brian struggled to answer, and before he could work out how to, the Toy Soldier took his hand, holding it palm-up in its own.

“Can _ you  _ feel this?” it asked him. 

Brian sighed. “The sensors on the back of my hand can tell that there is something pressed against it. Something hard and wooden, and shaped like a hand. I… I can know that, even with my eyes closed. But it’s not… it’s not the same thing as feeling it. I… it’s hard to explain.”

The Toy Soldier nodded, as if he had in fact explained himself quite clearly, and it did not ask him to clarify. Instead, it turned his hand over, so that it was palm-down, and held his fingers loosely in its own. “How about now?”

“I… much the same, I suppose,” Brian replied, a little uncertain. “There is more sensitivity in my fingers, to be sure, but the overall effect isn’t any different.”

The Toy Soldier nodded again, as if his reply were exactly what it had expected. “Then…” It paused, almost as if it were uncertain, or perhaps bracing itself. “What about now?” It tightened its grasp on his fingers ever so slightly, then bowed while raising his hand in one smooth motion to place its wooden lips upon the brass of his knuckles with the miniscule clack of a kiss.

Drumbot Brian stopped breathing and, without need of air for anything other than speaking or singing, forgot to start again for a good long minute. A few of the circuits of his brain began to whir a little harder than usual to process his surprise. Inside his chest, dials and gauges ticked around to confirm that his heart had begun to beat very slightly faster, though no physical process within his body would warrant it. The Toy Soldier’s eyes flicked up expectantly, and Brian forced his chest cavity to expand in a long inhale.

“Yes,” he replied, finally and unexpectedly. “Yes, I did feel that. Thank you, Toy Soldier.”

The Toy Soldier raised itself up once more, painted smile wide and settled, and did not let go of his hand. “You are most welcome, Drumbot Brian! I felt it too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Did I know that this was going to turn into a ship fic when I started writing this? No! The Mechs will do what they want. Happy Yuletide!


End file.
